in which Americans act. The result is internal conflict that causes many Americans to fail to live up to their potential and to question their happiness, worth, and life's meaning. The characters in The Last Puritan embody elements of the genteel tradition. Nathaniel is business-minded and is committed to societal order without questioning its validity. Peter can't find peace because his experiences around the world are in conflict with what he feels, as an American and an Alden, he ought to do. Oliver's mother makes up rules without reason, or acts without a tradition or experience to warrant the action. Mario is an example of what life without the genteel tradition is like. He knows himself, makes decisions based on experience, and is interested in the experiences of others, avoiding the trap of egotism. Oliver, on the other hand, most exemplifies the tragedy of the genteel tradition through his Puritanism developed fully to its tragic, self-destructive end. "Here says Santayana, is the tragedy of the Puritan: the spirit that seeks to govern and is not content to understand, that rebels against nature and animal faith and demands some absolute sanction for love. But the tragedy of Oliver was deeper than this. Your true puritans, who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, stopped the mouths of lions, were men and women of ardors, even gaiety. Oliver was the child of a dead faith, of a marriage without love and a home without laughter. And so he could neither believe in any cause nor laugh at himself nor forget himself in love. Santayana has portrayed not the tragedy but the DEATH of puritanism." Perhaps Santayana was too occupied with describing the genteel tradition to make clear that both it and practical America are at fault in denying to the individual the freedom of spirit and thought...although Oliver should have been a saint, but he lived in a spiritual vacuum, which was not conductive to spiritual growth. Santayana's Spirit in The Last Puritan Santayana describes Oliver as a spiritual person, and according to Santayana's ontology the "spirit is a natural observer." The trouble with Oliver is that he only knew how to "observe"; he was trapped in some sort of mystical transcendentalism inherited from his parents. At the same time, he felt obliged to follow through with the hollow duties assigned to him by his society. "It was Oliver, not I, who didn't